I have been looking more seriously at the changes that I need to make. Diet, exercise, healthy living. Everything just seems so overwhelming. Two weeks ago I decided to cut out one thing that is affecting me: caffeine. I'm not someone who drinks six cups of coffee per day, but I do drink a grande cup of Starbucks soy chai each morning (sometimes two in a day!). When I don't drink it, I find myself suffering by noon. I started researching some of the side effects of caffeine. Anxiety is one that stuck out; I have self-diagnosed PMDD, so in my research I saw that caffeine is pretty bad for someone with PMDD. I also go through the "crash" during the day where I feel terrible, am groggy, etc. So I decided to quit my super expensive habit of drinking Starbucks.
The first day failed as I had my chai before work; my co-workers were really hard on me because they knew what my plans were. The next day I succeeded. I had a headache by noon, and took two naps at two hours each; it was difficult to say the least. Day two I slept later than usual by about two hours (9:30am). I felt okay in the morning, but knew that once I was a few hours past my first normal dose of caffeine, I'd feel the side-effects. Yep, I dragged myself to work and had an exhausting day. My muscles hurt everywhere and I felt dehydrated, no matter how much water I drank. I felt out of it the whole day, and my co-workers, boss and even a random customer asked me what was wrong.
Day three was still exhausting -- all of my muscles ached, I felt tired all day and I still felt like I was in a funk. My boss wanted to strangle me. I was annoyed and had a shorter fuse than normal, which was tough because I've made some huge personal strides at work lately.
The rest of the first week went okay; I found that I stopped enjoying the breakfast sandwich I normally got from Starbucks, because the two items usually go together and it just wasn't the same. It left me with positive and confused feelings all at once; I have stopped spending $7-8 per day on Starbucks, but my routine was always to start there. I usually start my day with a drive with my dog so that can have something exciting to do. I do this because he used to get sick quite frequently when I took him to the dog park. So, what now? I substituted other things - Subway breakfast sandwich, a stop off to get a bagel, etc. So, it is just confusing.
I've just completed the second week of being caffeine (well, Chai) free. The end of my first week, and the beginning of the second week were interesting. I have noticed that I'm more depressed lately and I'm much more lethargic. I kind of miss the jolt in the morning where I have a great bolt of energy, but I don't miss the afternoon lull or the sweating and rapid heartbeat if I drank chai too quickly. I'm moving in a couple of months to another city, and my life and my job are almost up in the air which are most likely contributing factors, but I can't help but think that the lack caffeine is not helping me. I don't want to start drinking it again, and I look forward to see how I can progress.
